David Coulter has assumed leadership of the state's economic development powerhouse as the new Oakland County executive and already made a big change: firing the chief deputy who had been in charge of it.

That isn't to say that Coulter, the first Democrat to hold the executive position in county history after L. Brooks Patterson's death and a bloody and partisan appointment process, will clean house and turn the county's potpourri of business attraction and economic development initiatives topsy-turvy.

You can expect some of Patterson's efforts, such as Main Street Oakland County established in 2000 to reinvigorate historic downtowns, to probably stay unchanged during Coulter's partial term.

Ditto the Oakland County Business Roundtable, a group of more than 100 business, government and education representatives Patterson set up in 1993 to make recommendations that are largely rubber-stamped by the county.

Both programs, long feathers in the late Republican stalwart's hat, were singled out in an hour-plus interview with Crain's last week as good ideas that were implemented and had a direct positive impact in Coulter's hometown of Ferndale.

Yet there are sure to be changes ahead, with a Democrat leading the county's 1.25 million people as executive and a slim 11-10 Democratic majority on the county commission.

First of them: Coulter, the former mayor of Ferndale who previously was a county commissioner, said that he broomed out Timothy Meyer, the former Oakland Community College chancellor who became a deputy county executive in charge of economic development in February 2018, because he "wanted a clean start there."

He didn't elaborate. Coulter said he would seek deputies who have expertise in areas like economic development and health care, two of his key issues, and hire them soon.

But, for the time being at least, Coulter has a pair of former Republican state lawmakers in Mike Kowall of White Lake Township and Michael McCready of Bloomfield Hills filling economic development roles.

"Economic development is a particular area of interest and focus of mine," Coulter said, noting that he's not sure whether he will retain Kowall and McCready, the latter whose appointment to the Economic Development and Community Affairs director position is being held up by the county commission over his votes in the state Legislature repealing the state's prevailing wage and curtailing minimum wage and paid sick time laws.

"I don't know, I don't know. I'm having these one on ones with everyone who reports directly to me. I'm, I think, meeting Mike (McCready) later this week."

The ideological differences between Coulter and Patterson are large, however, and how the new executive pursues economic development in the coming 16 months can be seen in a few areas.

Coulter, on the other hand, wants to encourage denser communities however he can.

"I'm more interested in trying to populate our existing areas," Coulter said. "But I wouldn't put some sort of moratorium on it. I mean, it's a free country and the growth is going to happen where the market wants it to go. But I am a big champion of redeveloping our older areas and making them more attractive."

And Coulter has long been a proponent of a regional transit system, while Patterson was long viewed as an obstacle to one. The former views that as a key to business attraction and recruitment, pointing to Amazon.com Inc. specifically seeking such transit options for its employees during its frenzied and highly public search for its so-called "second headquarters" in 2017 and 2018.

"The (economic development) philosophy should be independent of partisan politics, and the philosophy should be in an era where we have historic investments in infrastructure that are beginning to fail," said Vicki Barnett, Patterson's Democratic opponent in 2016. "We can no longer afford sprawl, and we have to find a way to redevelop the existing infrastructure in Oakland County and build on that, and stop building roads to nowhere and concentrate on our inner ring suburbs."

He comes to power with perhaps less political capital than he would like, assuming the executive duties through appointment than election.

He said Marcia Gershenson, then the acting board chair, reached out to him on the morning of Patterson's funeral after David Woodward controversially rescinded his resignation from the board and his chairmanship so he could seek the executive appointment. He said she asked him if he would be interested in the executive position. The following day, during an hourslong board meeting, Coulter was voted into office in an 11-10 partisan vote after several failed procedural wranglings by the GOP. The matter is still being contested by the Oakland County Republican Party in court.

That comes after falling 2.2 percent annually during the 2000s as the recession took its toll and 156,500 jobs with it. During the 1990s, county job growth was 2.8 percent per year on average, for 182,000 jobs. And last year, the unemployment rate was 3.3 percent, well below the national average of 3.9 percent.

It has attracted high-profile investment and new North American corporate headquarters, but has seen political and economic sea changes in the last decade or so.

It wasn't long ago that the county was considered a bastion of Republican politics. All six countywide positions — executive, sheriff, prosecutor, clerk/register of deeds, treasurer and water resources (formerly drain) commissioner — were held by Republicans. There was a time in recent memory when the county board had four Republicans for every Democrat.

Cracks in the GOP stranglehold became apparent in 2008 with the election of Andy Meisner and Jessica Cooper as Democratic candidates for treasurer and prosecutor, respectively, to unseat Pat Dohany and defeat David Law, both Republicans. Fellow Republican John P. McCulloch, the longtime water resources commissioner and county political power player, only beat a Democratic challenger by 74 votes that year. Four years later, Republican Bill Bullard Jr. lost the clerk position to which he was appointed to Lisa Brown, a Democratic former state lawmaker. McCulloch lost to Jim Nash, another Democrat. And now with Coulter replacing Patterson, only Republican Sheriff Michael Bouchard remains.

And the shift in politics has been coupled with a renewed interest in Detroit.

Companies from around Oakland County have been moving their offices to the city in tandem with young adults — the largest workforce demographic in the U.S. — wanting to work and live in walkable areas.

Ally Financial had explored building a new headquarters in Oakland County but ultimately moved its hundreds of employees into a Dan Gilbert-owned skyscraper. Google left Birmingham to move to an office next to Little Caesars Arena. Microsoft bolted from Southfield to take a large footprint in the One Campus Martius building. LinkedIn, Twitter, IBM and other tech companies all have presences in the city, not north of Eight Mile Road.

Coulter is aware of that, and doesn't find the region's version of tenant musical chairs particularly productive, much as Patterson did not.

"I don't disagree with Brooks," he said. "That's a zero-sum game for the region, right? If you're just poaching companies from Macomb and Wayne and they are poaching them from Oakland, that would not be my strategy. To me, the way you approach that is to be actively engaged with regional development and try to work together to bring firms and employers from outside the region here, that would be the ultimate goal."